almost there

As you know, we're just renting our office space right now. And for a pretty small company like ours, rent can eat up a chunk of the revenue.

Luckily, our company did well enough last year to enable us to buy our own office space. We got it on a pre-selling deal, so we paid a little less but had to wait a year for the developers to finish it.

Well, it's almost done :)





We can't post a lot of pictures yet because our walls/cubicles are still not in. It's just a big white box right now.

We have nifty ideas for our new (cozy) office space, though. We'll update you as we go along.

Wish us luck!

work as usual

It's been work as usual here.




Hey, we're not complaining :)

shirts!

The shirts turned out to be too big for us ladies, so now only our boys wear them.
We’re thinking of doing more interesting designs. Perhaps we’ll use this (it’s from our website):

we're here!

Google maps is so cool. We actually found our office!

This is the closest view the map could get:



And this is our office from a bigger perspective:



Yup, that’s Mindanao Avenue right there. You will also see our neighbors – three schools, a McDonald’s outlet, and a boxing gym. Very neat. – JONAS

let's see if this works

Woody Leonhard says that work is something you do, not something you travel to. We are giving his idea a spin and try telecommuting in the next few months. Sieg will be letting a few high-performing, self-managing team members to work wherever they want, whenever they want.

We have the technology to carry it out. WiFi and other telecommunication links will replace the daily commute to the office. Our management style has always been based on results and not on close scrutiny of individual employees, anyway. We have always managed ‘by objective,’ never managed ‘by observation.’ Why not loosen the ties a bit and give highly-productive employees the freedom to work away from their cubicles? They can use their commuting time to work more, and therefore produce more. Hopefully, this new set up also lessens their stress, allows them to have a life outside of work, and ultimately become even better team members.


Ingrid got more done during her trial telecommuting day. We surprised her when she was telecommuting in her favorite Figaro outlet. She was hard at work, alright, and seemed pissed when we disturbed her. Sorry! Just checking if you're really working!

However, the telecommuting plan is not something we are ready to implement for all our team members right away. We are confident that some of our team members can handle the flexibility, but let’s face it – not everyone can work unsupervised. Quality of our software and content may suffer.

We may also try striking a balance. We may require our team to report in the office at least two times a week during critical days, and then telecommute the rest of the week. We will roll out the plan slowly but surely in the next few months and keep you posted. - JONAS

quick pictures from training day

Editing each other/Viewing the presentation


Ingrid and Jonas in the corner/Digs (the speaker) discussing Strunk and White with Leah/Leah and Masi answering some exercises


More lecture/Ingrid and Digs


Welcome, Sieg Web Solutions!/June editing

burping at work

Today is June’s birthday. She is one of our new writers.

Team Sieg loves to eat. This birthday is a perfect excuse to consume strawberry mouse, chicken, cheese-loaded spaghetti, and everything else unhealthy.

I was too hungry to really take pictures, but I managed to get a few incoherent ones:


That’s June blowing her candle.


Everybody wants chicken.


Coca Cola is good for the body.


Miguel tries not to eat before the birthday girl does

Tomorrow, we’re off to Sulo Hotel for a seminar on technical grammar and a planning conference. That’s two days of boot camp. We hope the hotel food is good.

new sofa

Every office has a couch. Ours is tangerine.



IN OTHER NEWS

So the glasses took up my whole face (and Jonas'), but the whole 3D experience was very amusing. This was the most fun we've had in weeks. And probably all the fun we will have in the next two weeks. There will be so much to do in the office in the coming days. Now is the time to just be silly.


Distorted faces

NASCAR is now showing on IMAX in the Mall of Asia. I hear they're showing Superman on 3D, too. I don't know. We are so boring might actually watch that.

well-fed = productive

People often ask us how we still manage to eat (given all the deadlines). Well, this is how:



This is what my desk looks like on a typical Thursday. Jonas comes over with a takeout sushi from the cool Japanese food outlet in the nearby mall and we eat while we work. Everyone in the team does the same.

There's also free coffee and a collosal bag of assorted bread from The French Baker. We have to keep the sugar up.

new team

The new fulltime team is a very interesting, very well-educated bunch. The three (of the six) were actually full scholars in this country’s top university, and the other three all came from international schools.
Two of them speak four languages (like me!)

We’ve been scouring the vicinity for cheap but good restaurants, and so far we have found three – Kowloon West right along the highway, The Old Spaghetti House (which is one minute away), and the convenience store downstairs (the lady who owns it makes excellent to-go lunch packs). Our conversations during lunch are very intellectual – just as I imagined it would be. Most of these new recruits are into art films, difficult books, etc. You get the picture. We talk about the overrated Stanley Kubric, the dumbification of Umberto Eco in the name of Dan Brown, Nietzsche and whether or not god is dead, etc. Sometimes the guys talk about how lame the new XBOX games are, and form time to time, we girls talk about fashion.

But the best thing about the new team is their diligence. Leave them for three hours and you will come back to a self-managing, hardworking group. Give them free coffee, and they’re good to go.

I really like how Sieg turned out. This is very cool. These new team members are just who we need to meet new demands.

debate

Today, a good ten minutes was spent figuring out who will eat the leftover Margherita pizza from the cafe downstairs.



He won.

working on a sunday

The core people of Team Sieg are all awfully hardworking — we stay in the office until the weekends beating deadlines and doing touchups. It’s hard to stay focused sometimes. Top-ranking writer Janice would rather be in the beach, editor Kim would rather be shopping for shoes, Ingrid would rather be watching her DVDs, and CEO Jonas would rather be flying his RC plane. But we don’t really mind working way over time. The Sieg office is fun — there’s flowing coffee and free food. Someone brings a plate of sushi, and all is well again.


Ingrid and her very neat workplace.


Jonas tweaking with the server, and Janice researching for her articles.


Jonas taking a break from hardcore programming to watch a movie.



Jerry, Kim and Janice stuffing themselves with free sushi.


Our friend Barry dropped by with pizza.


Ingrid and Jonas being dorks.


All cleaned up for dinner.

__________

Useless trivia. Sieg has four wall clocks — one for each major client’s time zone. That’s Manila, New York, Berlin, and Sydney.